Jason wrote:For me it depends on the nation I'm playing. If it's one I can find information on the actual army it had in real life then for me, recreating that is the perfect army
For smaller nations withe limited recruit bases, I tend to focus on a good core of regular infantry and heavy cavalry regiments with a reasonable number of cannon but not too many. In such cases I tend not to have many dragoons and those I have I tend to use for patrolling.
With larger nations who have good recruit bases, I tend to have specialised armies-a field army (of several) of infantry (including light and dedicated grenadier battalions) and heavy cavalry; a 'guard corps' of elite only units; a separate "artillery corps" (field, siege, mortars, engineers and a small escort of infantry and dragoons); and a 'flying column' of dragoons.
My view is that if you have a army with a strong historic identity such as the Swedes or WSS English its best stick as close as possible to the historic model/tactics rather than trying new things. Swedes for instance are deadly if organized into flying columns of Inf/Cav .....with a few light guns and ordered to attack at speed, but if you try to use "Swedish" tactics/organization with other Nations.......best of luck! I am staying loyal to Artillery.
Also if your position includes non standard/European troops like light Cavalry, Tribal foot, light infantry you should use them to your advantage. Since every troop type has its advantages & disadvantages the more troop types you have the better.
Ref troop proportions this is going to depend on area's of operation historically armies used 30% to 50% cavalry with higher numbers of cavalry used by eastern powers and generally its best to stick to this. Since Infantry form the majority of garrisons I tend to go 50/50 in field armies but the overall percentage of cavalry gets reduced by the number of mostly infantry garrisons deployed.
Ref Cavalry I go 50/50 Heavy Cavalry/Lt Cav or Dragoons. Since at least half of my Dragoons/Lights will be detached on patrol, or as seperate small forces to escort supplies, raiding/scouting coloums this will mean roughly 3 heavy or lancers for each Light or Dragoon in the main army.
Unlike Mark & others I dont like Artillery forces marching serperate to the main army. Ok so the guns slow up the Army but I dont want to start a siege/battle without them! And if you lose the guns the whole campaign can be ruined. Thus if you are typical European Power planing to beseige a hostile fortress I think you should look to have:
1) ST inc Cavalry/Infantry/Artillery/Engineers to conduct siege.
2) Force of Lights/Dragoons to scout & raid ahead.
3) Supply column of small force of dragoons/Inf with 15,000 tons of grain ready to re-supply.
Some players may favour splitting the main army into a force to conduct the siege inc all the siege guns and a covering force inc most of the cavalry. Such "Armies of Oberservation" used by Marborough & Marshal Saxe etc intend to stop any relief attempts by fighting a open field battle or blocking the relief at a distance away from the siege works.
However many commanders still like a single force which means using the old siege method of digging siege works which face both outwards & inwards and fighting off any relief from the field works.
In G2 with the the Ottomans I used the old method but with hordes of light cavalry thrown out.........so any relief Army needed to march across "scorched earth" and deal with hordes of skirmishers/arnauts behind every tree before getting to the siege lines.
In G7 my Spanish are very modern.
In G9 Augustus is still trying to convince the Diet that buying some Siege Guns is actually a good idea. Think Saxon-Polish forces are basically a relief force or perhaps a Army of Obervation for allies.
However its fair to say that while you may have idea's about your perfect Army when you come to fight almost certainly most troops will be in the wrong place.
At the start of our period